User blog:Tesla Man/WikiLost - E17 - The Road Ahead
Welcome back to WikiLost! This is the season 3 premier. To catch up on the series, check out my recap page which provides summaries of each episode and does a pretty fine job at it if i do say so myself. Just as an update and a testament to how far we've come, the Word document that holds my story currently has 87 pages and 36k words. That either means I'm hella dedicated or have absolutely no life. Just a heads up, these upcoming episodes will be relatively slow paced because they'll be more society based and less action and drama based. So anyways, here's Season 3! ---- Barry slid the razor down his face, the shaving cream sliding with it as he removed the shadow that was appearing on his face from the week. 7 months ago they had found the shaving kit in the Four Stars camp, and they’ve been making quite the use of it. Everyone was cleanly shaven, their hair was trimmed, and they looked fresh. Barry took hold of a buzz cut, his long curly hair wasn’t helping in the summertime, the bright rays of sun beating down on his hair made him twice as tired. Jason cut is hair short too, with a little bit of hair in the front which naturally stood up, and he shaved his face as well. Max shaved his head and kept the facial hair, making him look older than his actual age of 44. Barry washed out the razor in a tub of water and pulled out a pair of scissors from the kit. He slid it up close to the side of his face and caught the bandage in the blade. He clipped down and continued the action until he could unravel his bandages. That was another reason he cut his hair, the bandages stuck to his hair every night, and it was a pain taking it off every morning having to unstick it from his hair. He tossed the bandages into a bag in the corner of the building and looked in the reflective steel that was hanging from the brick wall. He pulled the bandana over his head and over his scarred and bloodied eye socket and tied a knot in the back. He turned to face the door and stepped out of his house. All around him, people were working, carrying in loads of fruit and meat in wheelbarrows they had constructed. The wooden wall was sturdy; ten feet tall and two logs wide, with breaks in it in the front and back of camp for entry and exit. It had been completed for about six months now, and the west wing was in preparation to be demolished as the group continued to replace tents with brick houses. There definitely wasn’t enough space for the group of forty, plus the recreational building being built like a church at Father Nick’s request, Bathrooms, and a new laboratory for the scientists at the camp. At the moment, 15 extra houses were built, and three more were under construction. It took about a month or two to complete a house; to bake the four hundred bricks, to construct the foundation, to set up the wooden frame, and to top it off with a metal plate roof from the airplane. They were running out of the metal, the plane was almost stripped entirely of its shell, so they began building the roofs with logs that were cut into flat edges. Barry walked past the armory, a small shack with a heavy lock around it that was filled with the pistols, machine guns, rifles, snipers, and the single panzerfaust. The group had resorted to spear hunting to conserve bullets, and with no sign of Community in the past half year, the group found it best to keep passive. Max was in charge of it, he kept it locked and stood guard of it every night. His house was right outside of it, so any commotion was easily heard from his two roomed home. Max was the only person in Database to carry a gun. A pistol, which he kept on his side at all times. He had acquired a habit of constantly patting his side to make sure it was still there. He’s only needed to use it once, and that was to shoot a boar that had attacked Reignic. Barry passed Jason and patted him on the back. He was sitting in his wheelchair at one of the tables, with a pen in hand working on a map of the island. He had been working on the map for about a month now, and every other day Lexi would go scout and retrieve data. He did it to find a way off the island. Unlike the rest of the camp, Jason didn’t accept life on the island and he knew there was a way off. Evol told them about a radio station somewhere on the island that Community finally was able to make work just before it was dissolved and Jason saw this as their way out. Evol was kept in the old laboratory up the mountainside, within the dark brick room Reignic locked himself in for months. Reignic wore sunglasses, his eyes never adjusted to the sunlight so his vision was terrible and direct contact with the sun could blind him. Evol was kept chained, Lexi would bring him food twice a day and interrogate him once a week, and so far, the only information they got from him was about the radio station. Evol was playing his cards well, never giving away too much information to save his own life. If he were to tell all of his secrets, he would definitely be killed out of lack of usefulness. Lexi cared for his hand which Max removed from him the night Captain died, but never gave him priority health care. Lexi was pregnant, she never told anybody, and everybody thought she had had sex with somebody on the island, but she knew. She had been raped countless times when Lucidus took over. He never let anybody else rape her, acting like she was some sort of treat, and by the end of their captivity, she would’ve been surprised if she wasn’t pregnant. He said she reminded him of Negative, her new tan skin and curved body turned him animalistic, and Lexi grew sick every time he pulled her into a tent and slid her bra off over her head. Not because she knew what was coming, after time, it didn’t hurt anymore, but because when he did it, he closed his eyes, and she couldn’t imagine what he was imagining what he was doing to Negative in his mind. She never told anybody, she acted as confused as anybody, and Barry took special interest in her case. As far as ranks go, Jason assumed the leader position, reminiscent of the first week of the plane crash, and he was doing a fine job at it. His limited mobility didn’t give him many options as to how to benefit the community in comparison to everybody else, so naturally he took the job so everybody else could be beneficial. He’d never told anybody about who he was before the plane crash, much like Max, he preferred to keep that a secret in the event he returns home. To be honest, Jason wasn’t a leader, he had no qualities of being a leader before he crashed on this island, and he was a truck driver. His parents kicked him out and he dropped out of high-school. Education wise he was a failure and economically he was far from successful. He had been fired several times for picking fights with other truck drivers despite his non-threatening appearance, but he had a big mouth, but now, something switched in him and he became a leader. For some reason the anger went away, the stupidity left his body and he was now some intelligent being who somehow know how to lead a group of forty. Barry was leader of the farm wing of the camp. He helped grow the food from the fertile ground the island presented to him, and he taught people how to domesticate the boars. The process of domestication was slow, but within five months he had won over the savage beasts. After a while of feeding them, Barry would take them out in private and butcher them and take them into camp. A boar was a specialty meal, maybe only once a month or two, in the meantime they grew mangos and pineapples using seeds they collected from the jungle. While they farmed, every two days, Matt took a group the half mile to the shore and fished. They had built a small raft, not made for distance travel but made specifically for getting deeper out into the water for fishing. They made oars out of palm branches and used bamboo rods to form the platform the group stood on, carrying their net and dragging it behind them to catch fish. Over all there was a system for food production. Unless you were a child or an elder you had a role in the society. ---- “I’ve been doing research, looking around at the sick people. Lexi’s been doing a good job and all taking care of them, but I think there’s something else to it.” Bob was worried, the far corners of his eyebrows sloped down and there was more depth to the crinkle between his eyes. “Explain.” Barry began walking and Bob followed him and continued talking. “The sick, they’ve been throwing up, all of them. Not because their stomachs are sick, but because of excessive coughing. We’ve got one more patient in just this morning with the same problems. I think its infectious.” “How many people are there with the same problems?” “Only two. But we don’t know how to cure it, the medicine from Four Stars was not made with this disease in mind. We can give them anesthetics and make the pain go away, but that’s all we can do.” “How dangerous is it?” “Well, the vomiting is releasing stomach acid into the throat. Now the stomach was built for that acid but the soft flesh of the throat wasn’t. The throat’s already heavily scarred from coughing, but now the stomach acids are eating away at the throat. I predict in only a few days our first patient will have lost his speaking ability, in a few weeks, the entire esophagus will have eroded and there will be heavy bleeding. Basically, there’s no coming back from this without a cure.” “Why did you wait until now to tell us about this?” “We told Jason. He said to wait it out, see if it goes away, but now the vomiting symptom has made itself know to us. I didn’t want to talk to him since he looks pissed at the moment, so I thought I’d go to our second in command.” “Take me to the hospice tent.” “We need to run by Max and grab a gas mask for you first. We don’t want anybody breathing this in.” Barry nodded and in about five minutes Barry had a gas mask safely secured to his face and was entering the shelter. “Close the door behind you.” Lexi instructed, not wanting any of the air from the building escaping. Bob shut the door and Barry walked over to the first victim and crouched down to the low bed where the man was asleep, with his jaw hanging open taking short breaths. His shirt was removed and his chest was wet and sweating, his pectorals were red and patchy. “He dropped in the morning about a week ago. Gordon saw him going to his tent after dinner, and he woke up and took two steps out of his tent and hit the rocks.” Lexi took the towel from his forehead and dunked it into the water bucket, twisted it, then placed it back on the man’s forehead. “What did he have for dinner?” Barry questioned. “We aren’t sure, but we had pig that night. Most likely, he ate it.” “Bob told me there was somebody else, who was it?” “Brandon.” She walked into the second room where Barry followed, finding Brandon -now 16- laying naked on another bed. “We wanted to keep them separated in case one of them had signs of healing. It appears Brandon has a more… severe case of the disease.” She gestured to his crotch area. “His um… genitals are inflated. We suspect the disease made it there from the digestive tract. We’re guessing that the disease begins in the stomach and lungs, then through the lungs it gets into the blood stream and targets a specific part on the body to continue to spreading. As long as Brandon here hasn’t had any sex in the past few days he should be fine.” “And if he has?” Barry took a fleeting glance at Brandon’s crotch. “Then we risk the possibility that it has mutated.” “Did he have dinner?” “Surprisingly no. Negative needed his help up at the laboratory so he skipped it.” Barry’s face grew pale as he got a realization and ran out of the building, ripping the gas mask off his face, and dashed in the direction of the laboratory. He weaved around Max who tried to stop him and he barely jumped out the way of mothers playing with their children. He ran up the mountainside, losing his breath, and eventually broke into the laboratory door. “What were you doing two nights ago?” Barry found Negative chewing on a toothpick playing cards. “Keeping guard. What do you think I did?” Negative pulled the pick out from her teeth. “Well did you have dinner?” Barry approached her. “No. But I had a big lunch don’t worry about me baby.” She smirked and stood up in front of Barry and kissed him on the cheek and took a seat on a table next to him, spreading her legs just a little. In no way were Barry and her in a relationship, but Negative had a slutty attitude about her that she wouldn’t control. Barry looked next to her, a plate by her side with a thin bone gently placed on it. “You had Brandon come up here. What for?” “To bring me my dinner for course.” She hopped down from the table and wrapped her arms around Barry’s shoulders. “You said you didn’t have dinner.” Barry corrected her. “Now you’re going to tell me. Did you - A twenty something year old – bring Brandon up here to have sex with you?” Negative grew serious and backed away. “Well that’s none of your fucking business.” “Yes it is. Brandon’s in hospice right now. His dick’s swollen and I think you’re carrying something.” Barry grew agitated, not putting up with Negative’s ruses. “Well, if I were carrying something, wouldn’t I have it?” She slipped back into her slutty behavior and strode towards Barry, he hips swayed side to side and her deep tan skin began to show as she unbuttoned her top. She dropped the uniform to the ground and she pressed her bare chest against Barry. “I… I guess so.” Barry grew uncomfortable. A year before the crash, he got a divorce, and never felt comfortable around women since, but Negative had a charm to her. She pressed her lips against his and slipped her tongue into his mouth and forced him to the table. She began unbuttoning his shirt as her face was distracted with the kissing. She broke her lips from his and slid down his chest, dragging her tongue with her. She stood and dropped her pants and Barry stuttered and the pressure became too much for him as he pulled his shirt back on and left the laboratory, his eyes were dry and he rushed down to the hospice center. Negative watched him leave and walked back to her table, passing up the opportunity to put clothes back on as she picked a test tube in her hand and smiled. “This’ll do.” ---- “Negative contracted it but she has no symptoms.” Barry barged into the hospice door. “So it only attacks males? Assuming that she had sex with Brandon.” Lexi turned, and stood from her chair. “Stay sitting.” Barry kept her down, her baby was almost to be born. “Unfortunately yes, she did, and so yes. I also discovered that it is in the meat, specifically the pigs, but if it was in the pigs then why don’t we all have it? That’s the question of the day.” “The pigs.” Lexi looked at the man lying on the table. She got up and stumbled for the door, but was stopped by Barry. “What do you need me to do?” Barry looked her in the eyes. “When’s the next time we’re having pork?” Lexi stuttered. “Tomorrow. We’re going hunting tonight. Why?” “The virus isn’t in the domesticated pigs, it’s in the hunted ones. That means the disease is in the wild.” Lexi looked out the door. “Don’t go hunting tonight. I need you to get Nick and the two of you need to track a pig, see where it’s coming from, and then let us know. We might be able to find out what’s infecting them if we can find their home.” Barry nodded and put his hand on Lexi’s shoulder. “Go home, I’ll get Bob to take over your shift. I’m sure Jason won’t mind. You need rest.” Lexi smiled and left the building and walked to her shelter. Barry sighed and walked to the main house, looking around at the world they had built. Instead of surviving, people were actually living, building families and relationships. Max and Sierra found something in common with one another and they were spending a lot of time together. Matt found somebody, a man, but none the less he found love. Everybody was happy, which worried Barry every time he looked at Jorn. Jorn was quiet since his dad died, he spoke only with Brandon, and he kept the hat neatly on his head. He worked on the farm in his free time, and when he was done which was usually after everybody went to bed, he retired to a tent, all alone, but he never went to sleep. Barry could hear him every night, shuffling around in his tent, but never man enough to do anything about it. He felt bad for the boy, always giving him some extra food at dinner time when it was his turn to serve, and doing whatever he could to help. Shaun had given him a little wooden figurine- a sloth- and he always kept it around his neck. Nick was holding his service, slipping back into his priest roll again, teaching a small group of about ten out front of his house. Nick was a good man, always helping the community and supporting it. He was great with children, always volunteering to take care of them while their parents worked. Nick was in charge of keeping logs of everything. From how much food is harvested to the number of deaths per month (one which wasn’t used often as of recent). Barry kept walking until he was at the curtain/door of the main house, whereupon entering, he saw Bob talking to Jason about the situation. “Bob, Lexi’s taking a break, we need you on hospice duty. I can fill Jason in on the details, we learned some more things.” Bob nodded and left, leaving Barry and Jason. Barry informed Jason on the new information and the plans to track the pigs with Nick. Jason nodded and rolled his wheelchair back to a table with the map he had been drawing. Four Stars camp was connected to Database with a pencil line, which ran along the shore for the most part. “I’ve been considering your offer.” Jason twirled the pencil around his fingers. “And I think we need to do it.” He took a sip of water. “Not for your ‘over population’ bullshit reason, but to evacuate this settlement. We can’t be putting families in harm’s way of this disease, so we need to begin evacuating soon because we don’t know how fast it can spread. I’ll get the truck loaded with tents by the end of the day, and some men out to set them up and spend the night, but while you’re gone I’ll take a census and see who we think should go. From what you tell me, women are safe, so most of them will be staying here, everybody else who doesn’t either play a vital or supporting role in this community will be moved. I’ll get Ashley in charge of the other settlement, talk her into it, and hopefully before winter we can solve this problem.” “Fair enough.” Barry took a look at the map and the 10 mile line that ran through it and left, pulling open the curtain and closing it behind him. He scoured the camp, looking around for where Nick went, until he found him sitting by the fire. “I need your help with something.” He patted his back. Nick stood up and the two wandered off into the forest for a little while before they were out of ear of the camp. “There’s a virus, it’s running around camp and we already have two in critical condition. I don’t know if you’ve heard about it but it’s pretty bad.” Nick nodded. “I need your help tracking them and finding where they’re coming from, once we do, I’m going to figure out what’s wrong with them.” “What about Max or Ashley? They can track just as well as I can.” Nick interjected. “Jason needs to talk with Ashley and er… Max is a little occupied.” “Occupied? So am I, I have a church to run.” “Occupied with some more… important things.” He referenced his position as guard of the armory to which Nick held back his tongue from arguing about the importance of religion. “When do we leave?” “Hopefully right now.” Nick nodded and the two walked over to Max and grabbed to spears and began their search, letting Jason know they were headed out. ---- Hope you guys enjoyed the Season 3 premiere! It was a little slow paced so I tried to speed it up a wee bit and I put the events of three episodes into one so you didn't suffer reading a family life story without much action for half a season. The next few episodes are planned to be VERY interesting (at least to me) so stay tuned! Category:Blog posts